bottleneck | ▌│█║▌║▌║ open post ║▌║▌║█│▌

There's nothing wrong with the camp. It's perfectly fine. Everyone seems very nice, and you get to sleep in dorm rooms instead of cabins, and it is very much billed as the kind of camp that girls who get gum in their hair go to instead of the girls who put gum in others' hair. Dad had been very encouraging, and some part of Caitlin is very excited to be here.

If only there were less strangers.

Some are already forming little groups, because they always do. The kids that know each other already, or are here for the same course lineup. Only Caitlin doesn't know anyone, and she doesn't know how to tell which kids here are her kids, the medical kids and the chemistry kids. Or how to approach them if she did know how to tell them apart.

Wondering about all of this, observing it, is probably why she's standing in a Very Tall Boy's Way as he nearly runs her over and drops almost all of his things.

"Oh! Sorry!"

His things, for the record, are mostly some camp papers, a book on astronomy, and...three books about Area 51. Maybe he's just a big X-Files nerd?

"Oh -- god, I didn't see you."

Which could sound like a crack at her height, except he's giving her a very sincere doe-eyed look of apology before hurrying to pick up some of those scattered papers and things.

"Sorry. You okay?"

Edited 2016-06-03 02:53 (UTC)

"Are you?"

The move to help him pick up his books is immediate, and she stops just long enough to read the title on one. Uncovering the Truth: Area 51. O...kay. People have read weirder things, she's sure. Besides, this is science camp. There was bound to be one kid here who saw Contact too many times.

"I mean, yes, I'm fine. But you dropped... Things."

He shrugs, stacking a couple of books back in his arms. The fact that she doesn't think twice before moving to help is...kind of gratifying, actually? It's not like everyone back home is a jerk or anything, but no one being around to point and laugh (not naming any names Tony Woodward) is sort of new.

"It's cool. Not like I was looking where I was going."

Because she is really apologetic for someone he nearly bowled over, all things considered.

"You're, um..." He pauses, pointing at her briefly as though in hopes it'll help him remember. There was an introduction game thing in the morning, but he's forgotten half the names already. "Carol? No, wait, I got it. Caitlin? Please tell me it's Caitlin. Unless it isn't. Y'know, then -- tell me I'm wrong. Am I wrong? I shouldn't have said anything. I'm Barry. Which you...might remember?"

Oh, god. He's the most embarrassing person in the UNIVERSE.

"Yeah, I'm gonna stop talking now."

Edited 2016-06-05 04:31 (UTC)

A boy knows her name. A boy has remembered her name. Is she turning red? She feels a little like she's turning red as she hands the book back to him and tries to smile naturally. If she can remember how to.

"Yes. Caitlin, not Carol. I don't think there's a Carol, at least not that I've met so far. And you're Barry who... Sort of plays soccer?"

It's easy enough to remember his little fact from the game. Caitlin had barely been able to get half her alphabet filled before they'd run out of time, and she remembers Very Tall Boy (Who Is Named Barry, Remember That) had given his before rushing off to the next person.

He opens his mouth, like oh right, and then ducks his head to focus on gathering up some of those camp papers with a self-conscious laugh.

"Uh, yeah. I'm...really out of practice, but it was the only S-thing I could think of."

What is it her dad would say? Pretend you're at home wherever you are, and wherever you are will feel like home? Something like that, something he says to make her comfortable, to make her willing to be brave and face new situations by herself. She's trying, with Barry, and it seems to be working. Kind of. Not entirely, but enough that she's not running the other way.

"Better than mine. Memorizing the periodic table was probably easier than thinking of a fact on the spot like that." Said like a joke, one she'd tell her dad, though her eyes are on the ground to avoid seeing him make a face or do something other than appreciate the humor.

Thinking of jokes she'd tell her dad, though, reminds her of why she'd been standing in a walkway looking around in the first place.

"Um, where were you headed?" Attempting to sound casual, not at all panicked or worried or scared, like some little kid that wants to go home already (even though she does, a little). "I was trying to find the office, but I don't know my way around."

He actually stills when she makes her sort-of joke, looking up at her face as though trying to gauge her expression.

"You memorized the periodic table?" That is undisguised awe and appreciation in his voice and the wide set to his eyes as he digests that. "That's so cool. I've tried, like, a million times, but I always lose track somewhere around platinum. Or mercury. Or argon. And all those new elements are awesome but their names are so weird, right?"

It occurs to Barry belatedly that she might've been kidding. He really hopes she wasn't kidding, because this would be such an embarrassing admission. But this is science camp, right?

"Actually, I just came from the office. I can show you how to get there. If you want."

That's... Not at all the reaction she was expecting. Maybe a little laugh, some head shaking and moving on to another subject. Maybe a joke at her expense, though that seems silly in the context of science camp. The whole point was that the jokes here weren't at your expense.

"Yeah. And the new ones are kind of hard to fit into the song." Please, don't ask her to sing it. She'll try and run out of breath. It's best she just hum it and recite the elements in her head.

Oh, but the office. The holy grail. The place with the phone. Caitlin is smiling, and if she weren't worried she'd be beaming. "I'd like that, thank you."

He doesn't ask her to sing the song, but that doesn't mean he's forgotten about it. She kind of seems like she really wants to go to the office, okay, and they're going to be at camp for like a month or so anyway. Plenty of time to ask.

"Sure. You're welcome."

He's finally picked up everything he dropped and stands, holding out his free hand expectantly for the books she picked up before they start moving.

"Sooo, guessing you've never been here before."

The camp, he means. A few of the older kids have come more than once, though he isn't among them either.

She hands them over without a word of judgement regarding the subject matter. It's, honestly, almost entirely forgotten in the haze of a boy that knows her name showing her where the office is.

"No, never," and she tries to make it sound like a joke but it falls flat. Like saying it out loud has suddenly reminded her of how scary and foreign it is. "I've never even been to Central City before this."

For the moment, Caitlin isn't sure she likes it yet, though Barry seems okay. For the moment, she much prefers home. For the moment, she wants safe and predictable more than new and exhilarating because the former doesn't make her feel dizzy or inadequate. Just a little constrained, and she can cope with that a lot better.

A pretty girl who pays attention to him and doesn't think he's totally crazy or just an invisible nerd is...really new, when the girl isn't Iris. Usually, they don't notice him at all, but when they do it's never in the way he'd want.

"Wow," Barry says as they walk. "Really? Where are you from, Keystone?"

He would never have agreed to go to camp too far away, no matter how cool it sounded. It's be everything he's already worried about now but worse: who's going to visit his dad while he's gone? Who's looking for leads about the man in the lightning or other phenomena? What if something happens and he's not there to know? What if the lightning man comes back?

She'd be more focused on the anomaly of the nice boy helping her, of walking together somewhere with a nice boy, etc., if not for the goal in mind.

"Yeah. You're from here? Have you been to the camp before?"

It's easier to talk about this now, because otherwise she's worrying. How is Dad? How did the appointment go? Did they switch his meds? To which ones? Is Mom keeping track?

He shakes his head.

"No. I've never really been big on the summer camp thing."

Especially the away-from-home kind. Day camp is another thing.

"And, yeah, I grew up in Central. I've been here my whole life -- well, not here-here," with a gesture around the camp that he somehow manages with his arms full, "but in the city."

Caitlin grins down at the floor, small and sheepish and a little lopsided, but not willing to risk looking over at him.

"Me, neither. I always figured camp would be a lot of hiking and dumb macaroni art." It goes without saying that such things aren't going to be an issue at this particular camp, where most activities are indoors and the pranks will probably come from the robotics kids.

"Me too."

Joe took him and Iris hiking once or twice, and it was just really embarrassing. Nature and Barry don't get along too well, not when there's so much nature to make you trip and fall on your face.

"Here we are," he adds as they approach a fairly nondescript building. "The office is in here."

Oh, they're here. Something about it changes the atmosphere, and now she's worried about something else.

"They'll let me use the phone, right?"

She's looking at him now, with big eyes and concern, because she's not sure of the rules here and she's not sure what she'd do if this nice tall boy named Barry brought her all the way over here for nothing on top of not being able to check in on her dad.

He turns to her, opens his mouth, and then closes it.

"I...don't know. Maybe we can ask?"

He can't believe that out of all his worrying about being out of contact with his dad, he didn't think to find out before now if they'd be allowed to use the phones to call home. They have to be able to; he's not going to take no for an answer.

"Yeah, okay."

That isn't a terribly encouraging proposal, though. She needs to know her dad is okay, how the appointment went, what she's missing. To hear from him that he's fine and that she doesn't need to worry. Except, as far as authority goes, Caitlin isn't quite bold enough to not take no for an answer.

Her bottom lip is firmly between her teeth when they walk inside and find... No one. Not a counselor or administrator or parent.

"Well," and she looks at Barry as if he jinxed it, "Who do you want to ask?"

The injustice of it all rankles. Not that anyone's around to say no, but what if they do? What if they aren't allowed to use the phones? It's possible. Joe could've forgotten to check. Maybe they believe in that whole kids-and-parents-need-breaks-from-each-other thing. Maybe they'll ban campers from using the phones. They didn't say campers could. But then what's the point of having phones if that's the case? It's unfair and awful and if this rule exists it deserves to be broken. It's the principle of the thing!

"Just use it," Barry says. "I'll keep watch and let you know if anybody comes."

Her stomach has flipped and sunk and gone cold with resignation that she won't be making any calls when Barry suggests that.

"What?" Is this nice boy a sort of delinquent too?

"No, no, I can't," and her eyes are wide and she's shaking her head like it will make her want to break the imaginary possible rules any less, like it will dislodge her from having to choose. "What if they come back? And then I can't call again? I need to be able to make sure everything is okay."

Hidden somewhere underneath his pajamas in his bag, folded up and shoved into a copy of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is a layout of Iron Heights prison. Barry's old enough now to understand how bad of an idea a breakout would be and how impossible it'd be to try anyway. But he still reads and rereads it and thinks about new routes and strategies anyway, daydreams about if it were possible. What he'd do, what he'd say to his father, where they'd go.

So, yeah, maybe he is sort of a delinquent.

"If that happens, just say it's my fault. I made you break the rules even though you didn't want to. It's fine. Blame me."

"No!"

It is an immediate response, so much that it surprises her a little. How sudden it is that she absolutely, viscerally, does not want to get a call at the expense of another person. Even if she doesn't know him very well, even if he might be a very smart, very tall, very nice delinquent.

"No, I'm not going to get you into trouble for me. Don't you have calls to make, too?"

Barry's actually taken aback by how abrupt and impassioned her response is. He hadn't really, honestly expected it to be a big deal to a girl he's known maybe five minutes whether he gets in trouble or not. Sure, the consequences of rule-breaking might suck. But it doesn't have to be her problem.

"And if we get caught, I'll deal with it. But that's an if, and it's only gonna be more likely the longer we stand around arguing."

This feels impossibly risky. To do something you get caught at, like the wall between common sense and just picking up the stupid phone is insurmountable. But it isn't. The phone is right there on the front desk, a helpful post-it beside it that says 'Dial 9 For Outside Calls.' Caitlin looks at the phone, and then Barry, and then back at the phone.

God this is so stupid.

"Okay," and she sighs at herself as a strange mix of nausea and thrill at the potential of breaking rules washes over her. "Okay, I'll try to be fast."

PICK YOUR POISON
PIC PROMPTS / TFLN / RANDOM SCENARIO
HAN SOLO velocities	BETTY MCRAE bombsheller	RIVER TAM subsulcus	RIVER TAM (AU) comprehender
SIMON TAM vest	BRIA THAREN exulted	NADINE CROSS bridaled	GU JUN-PYO toddler
available on special request: veronica sawyer, benjamin linus, imani, maria deluca, mushu, poseidon, niccolò machiavelli, malik al-sayf, chloe

you're a monster jsyk

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